The  Century  Magazine. 


Vol.  XXXI. 


APRIL,  1886. 


No.  6. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


THE  QUADROONS. 

THE  patois  in  which  these  songs  are  found 
is  common,  with  broad  local  variations, 
wherever  the  black  man  and  the  French  lan- 
guage are  met  in  the  mamland  or  island  re- 
gions that  border  the  Gulf  and  the  Caribbean 
Sea.  It  approaches  probably  nearer  to  good 
French  in  Louisiana  than  anywhere  in  the 
Antilles.  Yet  it  is  not  merely  bad  or  broken 
French ;  it  is  the  natural  result  from  the  ef- 
fort of  a  savage  people  to  take  up  the  language 
of  an  old  and  highly  refined  civilization,  and 
is  much  more  than  a  jargon.  The  humble  con- 
dition and  great  numbers  of  the  slave-caste 
promoted  this  evolution  of  an  African- Creole 
dialect.  The  facile  character  of  the  French 
master-caste,  made  more  so  by  the  languorous 
climate  of  the  Gulf,  easily  tolerated  and  often 
condescended  to  use  the  new  tongue.  It 
chimed  well  with  the  fierce  notions  of  caste 
to  have  one  language  for  the  master  and  an- 
other for  the  slave,  and  at  the  same  time  it 
was  convenient  that  the  servile  speech  should 
belong  to  and  draw  its  existence  chiefly  from 
the  master's.  Its  growth  entirely  by  ear  where 
there  were  so  many  more  African  ears  than 
French  tongues,  and  when  those  tongues  had 
so  many  Gallic  archaisms  which  they  were 
glad  to  give  away  and  get  rid  of,  resulted  in 
a  broad  grotesqueness  all  its  own. 

We  had  better  not  go  aside  to  study  it  here. 
Books  have  been  written  on  the  subject.  They 
may  be  thin,  but  they  stand  for  years  of  la- 
bor. A  Creole  lady  writes  me  almost  as  I  write 
this,  "  It  takes  a  whole  life  to  speak  such  a 
language  in  form."  Mr.  Thomas  of  Trinidad 
has  given  a  complete  grammar  of  it  as  spoken 
there.  M.  Marbot  has  versified  some  fifty  of 
La  Fontaine's  fables  in  the  tongue.  Pere 


Gaux  has  made  a  catechism  in,  and  M.  Turi- 
ault  a  complete  grammatical  work  on,  the 
Martinique  variety.  Dr.  Armand  Mercier,  a 
Louisiana  Creole,  and  Professor  James  A. 
Harrison,  an  Anglo-Louisianian,  have  written 
valuable  papers  on  the  dialect  as  spoken  in 
the  Mississippi  delta.  Mr.  John  Bigelow  has 
done  the  same  for  the  tongue  as  heard  in 
Hayti.  It  is  an  amusing  study.  Certain  tribes 
of  Africa  had  no  knowledge  of  the  v  and  z 
sounds.  The  sprightly  Franc-Congos,  for  all 
their  chatter,  could  hardly  master  even  this 
African- Creole  dialect  so  as  to  make  their 
wants  intelligible.  The  Louisiana  negro's  r's 
were  ever  being  lost  or  mislaid.  He  changed 
donnir  to  dromV.  His  master's  children  called 
the  little  fiddler-crab  Tourloiiroit ;  he  simpli- 
fied the  articulations  to  Troolooloo.  Wherever 
the  r  added  to  a  syllable's  quantity,  he  either 
shifted  it  or  dropped  it  overboard.  Pdte  ? 
Non  /  not  if  he  could  avoid  it.  It  was  the 
same  with  many  other  sounds.  For  example, 
final  le ;  a  thing  so  needless  —  he  couldn't  be 
burdened  with  it ;  //  pas  capab\f  He  found 
himself  profitably  understood  when  he  called 
his  master  ai7nab''  et  nob\  and  thought  it  not 
well  to  be  trop  sensib''  about  a  trifling  /  or  two. 
The  French  11  was  vinegar  to  his  teeth.  He 
substituted  /  or  el  before  a  consonant  and  00 
before  a  vowel, or  dropped  it  altogether;  for 
une,  he  said  ^Z/^^"  y  (or pids,p^ is  ;  absohimentYv^ 
made  assoliment ;  tu  was  nearly  always  to  ;  a 
muldtresse  was  a  inilatraisse.  In  the  West  Indies 
he  changed  i-  into  ch  or  tch,  making  so?iger 
cho7ige,  and  suite  tchooite ;  while  in  Louisiana 
he  reversed  the  process  and  turned  ch  into  g 
—  c'erc'e  for  cherchez  or  chercher. 

He  misconstrued  the  liaisons  of  correct 
French,  and  omitted  limiting  adjectives  where 
he  conveniently  could,  or  retained  only  their 
final  sound  carried  over  and  prefixed  to  the 
noun  :  nhomme  —  zanij?iaux  —  zherbes  —  zaf- 


Copyright,  1886,  by  The  Century  Co.    All  rights  reserved. 


8o8 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


/aires.  He  made  odd  substitutions  of  one  hidden  under  these  apparently  nonsensical 

word  for  another.  For  the  verb  to  go  he  of-  lines  *  It  mocks  the  helpless  lot  of  three  types 

tener  than  otherwise  used  a  word  that  better  of  human  life  in  old  Louisiana  whose  fate  was 

signified  his  slavish  pretense  of  alacrity,  the  truly  deplorable.    Milatraisse  was,  in  Creole 

verb  to  run  :  mo  coiirri, —  mo  always,  never  song,  the  generic  term  for  all  that  class,  fa- 

je, —  vw  courri,to  coiirri.Ii coiirri ;  always  seiz-  mous  wherever  New  Orleans  was  famous  in 

ing  whatever  form  of  a  verb  was  handiest  and  those  days  when  all  foot-passengers  by  night 

holding  to  it  without  change ;  no  coiirri,  vo  picked  their  way  through  the  mud  by  the  rays 

coiirri,  ye  courri.    Sometimes  the  plural  was  of  a  hand-lantern  —  the  freed  or  free-born 

110^  zott —  we  others  —  coiu^ri^  vo  zott  courri.ye  quadroon  or  mulatto  woman.   Cocodrie  (Span- 

zoit  coyrri;  no  zott  courri  dans  bois —  we  are  ish,  cocodriiia,  the  crocodile  or  alHgator)  was 

going  to  the  woods.  His  auxiliary  verb  in  im-  the  nickname  for  the  unmixed  black  man ; 

perfect  and  pluperfect  tenses  was  not  to  have,  while  trotdoulou  was  applied  to  the  free  male 

but  to  be  in  the  past  participial  form       but  quadroon,  who  could  find  admittance  to  the 

shortened   to   one  syllable.    I  have  gone,  quadroon  balls  only  in  the  capacity,  in  those 

thou  hadst  gone:  7no  7/  courri,  to  'te  courri.  days  distinctly  menial,  of  musician  —  fiddler. 

There  is  an  affluence  of  bitter  meaning  Now  sing  it ! 

"Yellow  girl  goes  to  the  ball; 
Nigger  lights  her  to  the  hall. 

Fiddler  man ! 
Now,  what  is  that  to  you  ? 
Say,  what  is  that  to  you, 

Fiddler  man  ?  " 

It  was  much  to  him  ;  but  it  might  as  well 
have  been  little.  What  could  he  do  ?  As  they 
say,  "  Ravette  zameiii  tiniraison  divantpoule  " 
("  Cockroach  can  never  justify  himself  to  the 
hungry  chicken  ").  He  could  only  let  his  black 
half-brother  celebrate  on  Congo  Plains  the 
mingled  humor  and  outrage  of  it  in  satirical 
songs  of  double  meaning.  They  readily  passed 
unchallenged  among  the  numerous  nonsense 
rhymes  —  that  often  rhymed  lamely  or  not  at 
all  —  which  beguiled  the  hours  afield  or  the 
moonlight  gatherings  in  the  "  quarters,"  as 
well  as  served  to  fit  the  wild  chants  of  some 
of  their  dances.  Here  is  one  whose  character- 
istics tempt  us  to  suppose  it  a  calinda,  and 
whose  humor  consists  only  m  a  childish  play 
on  words.  (Quand  Mo  'Te,  page  824.) 

There  is  another  nonsense  song  that  may 
or  may  not  have  been  a  dance.  Its  movement 
has  the  true  wriggle.  The  dances  were 
many;  there  were  some  popular  in  the  West 
Indies  that  seem  to  have  remained  compara- 
tively unknown  in  Louisiana :  the  beiair,  bele, 
oxbela;  the  cosa^i^ey  the  biguine.  The  guiouba 
was  probably  the  famed  juba  of  Georgia  and 
the  Carolinas.  (Neg'  pas  Capa'  Marche,  page 
824.) 


* 


-*  *— ^  

-g      f    e— 

-F— »— S— - 

Mi   -  la  -  t 

^  ^           62  6* 

raisse    cour  -  ri  dan 

p-«  — » —  m—  m 

-E^ — =^ 

s    bal,  Co 
"  ^      ^ — ^ 

-    CO  - 

—  e 

drie      po'   -  t 

r  

h         fa  - 

nal,  Trou-lo 
m      m  - 

u- 

L  ^  1^  1^  

lou!      C'est    pas     zaf  -  faire     a       tou,       C'est   pas      zaf-faire      a       tou,   Trou-lou  -  lou ! 


THE  FIDDLER. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


II. 


THE  LOVE-SONG. 


Among  the  songs  which  seem  to  have  been 
sung  for  then-  own  sake,  and  not  for  the  dance, 
are  certain  sentimental  ones  of  slow  move- 
ment, tinged  with  that  faint  and  gentle  melan- 
choly that  every  one  of  Southern  experience 
has  noticed  in  the  glance  of  the  African 
slave's  eye ;  a  sentiment  ready  to  be  turned, 
at  any  instant  that  may  demand  the  change, 
into  a  droll,  self-abasing  humor.  They  have 
thus  a  special  charm  that  has  kept  for  them 
a  place  even  in  the  regard  of  the  Creole  of 
to-day.  How  many  ten  thousands  of  black 
or  tawny  nurse  "  mammies,"  with  heads  wrap- 
ped in  stiffly  starched  Madras  kerchief  turbans, 
and  holding  Uit  maife  or  'tit  maitresse  to  their 
Vol.  XXXI.  — 84. 


bosoms,  have  made  the  infants'  lullabies  these 
gently  sad  strains  of  disappointed  love  or  re- 
gretted youth,  will  never  be  known.  Now 
and  then  the  song  would  find  its  way  through 
some  master's  growing  child  of  musical  ear, 
into  the  drawing-room;  and  it  is  from  a  Creole 
drawing-room  in  the  Rue  Esplanade  that  we 
draw  the  following,  so  familiar  to  all  Creole 
ears  and  rendered  with  many  variations  of  text 
and  measure.  (Ah  Suzette,  page  824.) 

One  may  very  safely  suppose  this  song  to 
have  sprung  from  the  poetic  invention  of  some 
free  black  far  away  in  the  Gulf  A  Louisiana 
slave  would  hardly  have  thought  it  possible  to 
earn  money  for  himself  in  the  sugar-cane  fields. 
The  mention  of  mountains  points  back  to  St. 
Domingo. 

It  is  strange  to  note  in  all  this  African- Creole 
lyric  product  how  rarely  its  producers  seem 


8io 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS, 


A   NURSE  MAMMIE. 


to  have  recognized  the  myriad  charms  of  na- 
ture. The  landscape,  the  seasons,  the  sun, 
moon,  stars,  the  clouds,  the  storm,  the  peace 
that  follows,  the  forest's  solemn  depths,  the 
vast  prairie,  birds,  insects,  the  breeze,  the 
flowers  —  they  are  passed  in  silence.  Was  it 
because  of  the  soul-destroying  weight  of  bond- 
age ?  Did  the  slave  feel  so  painfully  that  the 
beauties  of  the  natural  earth  were  not  for  him  ? 
Was  it  because  the  overseer's  eye  was  on  him 
that  his  was  not  lifted  upon  them  ?  It  may 
have  been  —  in  part.  But  another  truth  goes 
with  these.  His  songs  were  not  often  contem- 
plative. They  voiced  not  outward  nature,  but 
the  inner  emotions  and  passions  of  a  nearly 
naked  serpent-worshiper,  and  these  looked 
not  to  the  surrounding  scene  for  sympathy; 
the  surrounding  scene  belonged  to  his  mas- 
ter. But  love  was  his,  and  toil,  and  anger, 
and  superstition,  and  malady.  Sleep  was  his 
balm,  food  his  reenforcement,  the  dance  his 
pleasure,  rum  his  longed-for  nepenthe,  and 


death  the  road  back  to  Africa.  These  were 
his  themes,  and  furnished  the  few  scant  figures 
of  his  verse. 

The  moment  we  meet  the  offspring  of  his 
contemplative  thought,  as  we  do  in  his  apo- 
thegms and  riddles,  we  find  a  change,  and  any 
or  every  object  in  sight,  great  or  trivial,  comely 
or  homely,  is  wrought  into  the  web  of  his 
traditional  wit  and  wisdom.  "  Vo  mie,  savon, 
passe  godron,"  he  says,  to  teach  a  lesson  of 
gentle  forbearance  ("  Soap  is  worth  more  than 
tar").  And  then,  to  point  the  opposite  truth, — 
"  Pas  marre  so  chien  ave  saucisse  "  ("  Don't 
chain  your  dog  with  links  of  sausage  ").  "  Qui 
zamein  'tende  souris  fe  so  nid  dan  zore  9'at?" 
("  Who  ever  heard  of  mouse  making  nest  in 
cat's  ear  ?  ")  And  so,  too,  when  love  was  his 
theme,  apart  from  the  madness  of  the  dance 
—  when  his  note  fell  to  soft  cooings  the  verse 
became  pastoral.  So  it  was  in  the  song  last 
quoted.  And  so,  too,  in  this  very  African  bit, 
whose  air  I  have  not : 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


8ii 


"  Si  to  t6  tit  zozo, 

Et  mo-meme,  mo  te  fizi, 

Mo  sre  tchoue  toe  —  bourn 

Ah !  tch^re  bizou 

D'acazou, 

Mo  laimein  ou 
Comme  cochon  laimein  la  bou  I  " 

Shall  we  translate  literally  ? 

"  If  you  were  a  little  bird 
And  myself,  I  were  a  gun, 
I  would  shoot  you  —  bourn  ! 

Ah  !  dear  jewel 

Of  mahogany, 

I  love  you 
As  the  hog  loves  mud." 

One  of  the  best  of  these  Creole  love-songs 
—  one  that  the  famed  Gottschalk,  himself  a 
New  Orleans  Creole  of  pure  blood,  made  use 
of  —  is  the  tender  lament  of  one  who  sees  the 
girl  of  his  heart's  choice  the  victim  of  chagrin 
in  beholding  a  female  rival  wearing  those 
vestments  of  extra  quality  that  could  only  be 
the  favors  which  both  women  had  coveted 
from  the  hand  of  some  one  in  the  proud  mas- 
ter-caste whence  alone  such  favors  could  come. 
"  Calalou,"  says  the  song,  "  has  an  embroid- 
ered petticoat,  and  Lolotte,  or  Zizi,"  as  it  is 
often  sung,  "has  a  —  heartache."  Calalou, 
here,  I  take  to  be  a  derisive  nickname.  Orig- 
inally it  is  the  term  for  a  West  Indian  dish, 
a  noted  ragout.  It  must  be  intended  to  apply 
here  to  the  quadroon  women  who  swarmed 
into  New  Orleans  in  1809  as  refugees  from 
Cuba,  Guadeloupe,  and  other  islands  where 
the  war  against  Napoleon  exposed  them  to 
Spanish  and  British  aggression.  It  was  with 
this  great  influx  of  persons  neither  savage  nor 
enlightened,  neither  white  nor  black,  neither 
slave  nor  truly  free,  that  the  famous  quadroon 
caste  arose  and  flourished.  If  Calalou,  in  the 
verse,  was  one  of  these  quadroon  fair  ones, 
the  song  is  its  own  explanation.  (See  Pov' 
piti  Momzel  Zizi,  page  825.) 

"  Poor  little  Miss  Zizi !  "  is  what  it  means 
— She  has  pain,  pain  in  her  little  heart." 
^'  A  li "  is  simply  the  Creole  possessive  form  ; 

corps  a  moin  "  would  signify  simply  myself. 
Calalou  is  wearing  a  Madras  turban ;  she  has 
on  an  embroidered  petticoat;  [they  tell  their 
story  and]  Zizi  has  achings  in  her  heart.  And 
the  second  stanza  moralizes  :  "When  you  wear 
the  chain  of  love"  —  maybe  we  can  make  it 
rhyme : 

"When  love's  chains  upon  thee  lie 
Bid  all  happiness  good-bye." 

Poor  little  Zizi !  say  we  also.  Triumphant 
Calalou  !  We  see  that  even  her  sort  of  freedom 
had  its  tawdry  victories  at  the  expense  of  the 
slave.  A  poor  freedom  it  was,  indeed :  To 
have  f.  m.  c.  or  f.  w.  c.  tacked  in  small  let- 
ters upon  one's  name  perforce  and  by  law, 
that  all  might  know  that  the  bearer  was  not  a 


real  freeman  or  freewoman,  but  only  a  free 
man  (or  woman)  of  color, — a  title  that  could 
not  be  indicated  by  capital  initials;  to  be 
the  unlawful  mates  of  luxurious  bachelors, 
and  take  their  pay  in  musfins,  embroideries, 
prunella,  and  good  living,  taking  with  them 
the  loathing  of  honest  women  and  the  sala- 
cious derision  of  the  blackamoor ;  to  be  the 
sister,  mother,  father,  or  brother  of  Calalou; 
to  fall  heir  to  property  by  sufferance,  not  by 
law;  to  be  taxed  for  public  education  and 
not  allowed  to  give  that  education  to  one's 
own  children;  to  be  shut  out  of  all  occupa- 
tions that  the  master  class  could  reconcile  with 
the  vague  title  of  gentleman ;  to  live  in  the 
knowledge  that  the  law  pronounced  "  death 
or  imprisonment  at  hard  labor  for  life  "  against 
whoever  should  be  guilty  of  "writing,  printing, 
publishing,  or  distributing  anything  having  a 
tendency  to  create  discontent  among  the  free 
colored  population":  that  it  threatened  death 
against  whosoever  should  utter  such  things  in 
private  conversation ;  and  that  it  decreed  ex- 
pulsion from  the  State  to  Calalou  and  all  her  kin 
of  any  age  or  condition  if  only  they  had  come  in 
across  its  bounds  since  1807.  In  the  enjoyment 
of  such  ghastly  freedom  as  this  the  flesh-pots 
of  Egypt  sometimes  made  the  mouth  water 
and  provoked  the  tongue  to  sing  its  regrets  for 
a  past  that  seemed  better  than  the  present. 
(See  Bon  D'je,  page  826.) 

Word  for  word  we  should  have  to  render 
it, — "  In  times  when  I  was  young  I  never 
pondered  —  indulged  in  reverie,  took  on 
care,"  an  archaic  French  word,  zongler,  still 
in  use  among  the  Acadians  also  in  Louisiana; 
"mo  zamein  zongle,  bon  D'je"  —  "good 
Lord  !  "  "  Aftair''  is  "  a  cette  heure  "  —  "  at 
this  hour,"  that  is,  "now  —  these  days." 
"  These  days  I  am  getting  old  —  I  am  pon- 
dering, good  Lord !  "  etc.  Some  time  in  the 
future,  it  may  be,  some  Creole  will  give  us 
translations  of  these  things,  worthy  to  be 
called  so.  Meantime  suffer  this  : 

"  In  the  days  of  my  youth  not  a  dream  had  I,  good 
Lord  ! 

These  times  I  am  growing  old,  full  of  dreams  am  I, 
good  Lord  ! 

I  have  dreams  of  those  good  times  gone  by  !  {ter) 

When  I  was  a  slave,  one  boss  had  I,  good  Lord ! 
These  times  when  I'm  needing  rest  all  hands  serve  I, 

good  Lord  ! 
I  have  dreams,"  etc. 

III. 

THE   LAY  AND  THE  DIRGE. 

There  were  other  strains  of  misery,  the 
cry  or  the  vagabond  laugh  and  song  of  the 
friendless  orphan  for  whom  no  asylum  door 
would  open,  but  who  found  harbor  and  food 
in  the  fields  and  wildwood  and  the  forbidden 


8l2 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


places  of  the  wicked  town.  When  that  Cre- 
ole whom  we  hope  for  does  come  with  his 
good  translations,  correcting  the  hundred  and 
one  errors  that  may  be  in  these  pages,  we 
must  ask  him  if  Itfe  knows  the  air  to  this  : 

"  Pitis  sans  popa,  pitis  sans  nioman, 
Qui  9a  'ou'  zaut'  fe  pou'  gagnein  I'a'zanc,^ 
No  courri  I'aut'  bord  pou'  cerce  patt  9'at'^ 
No  tournein  bayou  pou'  pe9'e  patassa;^ 
Et  v'la  comm  9a  no  te  fe  nou'  I'a'zan. 


"  Pitis  sans  popa,  pitis  sans  moman, 

Qui  9a  "ou'  zaut'  fe,  etc. 

No  courri  dans  bois  fouille  latanie"*^, 
Xo  vend'  so  racin'  pou'  fou'bi'  plan9'e  : 
Et  v'la  comm'  9a,  etc. 

"  Pitis  sans  popa,  etc. 

Pou'  fe  di  the  n'a  fouille  sassaf'as, 

Pou'  fe  di  I'enc"  no  po'te  grain'  sougras ;  ^ 

Et  v"la,  etc. 

"  Pitis  sans  popa,  etc. 

No  courri  dans  bois  ramasse  cancos  ; 
Ave'  nou'  la  caze  no  trappe  zozos ; ' 
Et  v'la,  etc. 

"  Pitis  sans  popa,  etc. 

No  courri  a  soir  c'ez  ^NTom'selle  Maroto, 
Dans  la  rie  St.  Ann  ou  no  te  zoue  loto  ; 
Et  v"Ia,''  etc. 

"  Little  ones  without  father,  little  ones  without  mother, 
What  do  you  to  keep  soul  and  body  together  ? 

The  river  we  cross  for  wild  berries  to  search ; 

We  follow  the  bayou  a-fishing  for  perch ; 

And  that's  how  we  keep  soul  and  body  together. 

"Little  ones  without,  etc. 

Palmetto  we  dig  from  the  swamp's  bristling  stores 
And  sell  its  stout  roots  for  scrubbing  the  floors ; 
And  that's  how,  etc. 

"  Little  ones,  etc. 

The  sassafras  root  we  dig  up  ;  it  makes  tea  ; 
P"or  ink  the  ripe  pokeberry  clusters  bring  Ave ; 
And  that's  how,  etc. 

"  Little  ones,  etc.  » 
We  go  to  the  woods  calicos  berries  to  fetch, 
And  in  our  trap  cages  the  nonpareils*  catch; 
And  that's  how,  etc. 

"  Little  ones,  etc. 

At  evening  we  visit  Mom'selle  Maroto, 

In  St.  Ann's  street,  to  gamble  awhile  at  keno; 

And  that's  how  we  keep  soul  and  body  together." 

Here  was  companionship  with  nature  — the 
companionship  of  the  vagabond.  We  need  not 

1  L' argent — money. 

2  "  We  go  to  the  other  side  "  [of  the  river]  "  to  get  cats'  paws," 
a  delicious  little  blue  swamp  berrj-. 

3  The  perch  The  little  sunfish  or  "  pumpkin  seed,"  miscalled 
through  the  southwest. 

4  Dwarf  palmetto,  whose  root  is  used  by  the  Creoles  as  a  scrub- 
bing-brush. 

3  Pokeberries.  ^5  Cancos,  Indian  name  for  a  wild  purple  berr>-. 
"i"  Oiseau.x,  birds. 

8  The  nonpareil,  pape,  or  painted  bunting,  is  the  favorite  vic- 
tim of  the  youthful  iDird-trappers. 

9  Chevals  —  chevaux. 


doubt  that  these  little  orphan  vagrants  could 
have  sung  for  us  the  song,  from  which  in  an  ear- 
lier article  we  have  already  quoted  a  line  or  two, 
of  Cayetano's  circus,  probably  the  most  wel- 
come intruder  that  ever  shared  with  the  man 
Friday  and  his  son  g-dancing  fellows  and  sweet- 
hearts the  green,  tough  sod  of  Congo  Square. 

"  C'est  Miche  Cayetane, 

Qui  sorti  la  Havane 
Avec  so  chouals''  et  so  macacs.'^° 
Li  gagnein  ein  nhomme  qui  dance  dans  sac; 
Li  gagnein  qui  dance  si  ye  la  main  ; 
Li  gagnein  zaut',  a  choual,  qui  boir'  di  vin; 
Li  gagnein  oussi  ein  zein,  zoli  mom'selle, 
Qui  monte  choual  sans  bride  et  sans  sella ! 
Pou'  di'  tou'  9a  mo  pas  capab' ; 
Me  mo  souvien  ein  qui  'vale  sab'  ! 
Ye  n'en  oussi  tou'  sort'  betail. 
Ye  23as  montre  pou  la  negrail'; 
Gniapas  la  dotchians  dos-brile,^ ' 
Pou'  fe  tapaze  et  pou'  hirle ; 
Ce  gros  madame  et  gros  miche, 
Qui  menein  la  tons  pitits  ye, 

'Oir  ]^.liche  Cayetane, 

Qui  'rive  la  Havane 
Avec  so  chouals  et  so  macacs." 

Should  the  Louisiana  Creole  negro  under- 
take to  render  his  song  to  us  in  English,  it 
would  not  be  exactly  the  African- English  of 
any  other  State  in  the  Union.  Much  less 
would  it  resemble  the  gross  dialects  of  the 
English-torturing  negroes  of  Jamaica,  or  Bar- 
badoes,  or  the  Sea  Islands  of  Carolina.  If 
we  may  venture  — 

"  Dass  Cap'm  Cayetano, 

Wat  comin'  ftim  Havano,* 
Wid  'is  monkey'  an'  'is  nag' ! 
An'  one  man  w'at  dance  in  bag, 
An'  mans  dance  on  dey  han'  —  cut  shine' 
An'  gallop  boss  sem  time  drink  wine! 
An'  b'u'ful  young  missy  dah  beside, 
Ridin'  'dout  air  sadd"  aw  brid'e  ; 
To  tell  h-all  dat  —  he  cann'  be  tole. 
Alan  teck  a  sword  an'  swall'  'im  whole  ! 
Beas'es?'-^  ev'y  sawt  o'  figgah  ! 
Dat  show  ain't  fo'  no  common  niggah  ! 
Dey  don'  got  deh  no  po'  white  cuss' — 
Sunbu'nt  back  I  —  to  holla  an'  fuss. 
Dass  ladies  fine,  and  gennymuns  gran', 
Fetchiir  dey  chilluns  dah — all  han'! 

Fo'  see  Cayetano, 

W'at  come  fum  Havano 
Wid  'is  monkey'  an'  'is  nag'  I  " 

1"  Macaques. 

11  "Gniapas  la  dotchians  dos-brile." 

"  II  n'y  a  pas  la  des  dotchians  avec  les  dos  brules." 

The  dotchiaii  dos-bril:  is  the  white  trash  with  sunburnt  back, 
the  result  of  workmg  in  the  fields.  It  is  an  expression  of  su- 
preme contempt  for  the  pUits  bla^ics  —  low  whites  —  to  contrast 
them  with  the  gros  jnadanies  ct  gros  7i?ichies. 

1-  Riding  without  e'er  a  saddle  or  bridle. 

1  ^5  Beasts  —  wild  animals. 

*  To  turn  final  a  into  o  for  the  purpose  of  rhyme  is  the  special 
delight  of  the  singing  negro.  I  used  to  hear  as  part  of  a  moon- 
light game, — 


Come,  young  man. what  chews  tobacco,      I    had  a  wife  in  South  Cal-li  -  no  ;  Her  name  was  ole  Aunt  Di-noh. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


813 


A  CV 

A  remarkable  peculiarity  of  these  African 
Creole  songs  of  every  sort  is  that  almost  with- 
out exception  they  appear  to  have  originated 
in  the  masculine  mind,  and  to  be  the  ex- 
pression of  the  masculine  heart.  Untrained 
as  birds,  their  males  made  the  songs.  We 
come  now,  however,  to  the  only  exception  I 
have  any  knowledge  of,  a  song  expressive  of 
feminine  sentiment,  the  capitulation  of  some 
belle  Layotte  to  the  tender  enticement  of 
a  Creole-born  chief  or  candjo.  The  pleading 
tone  of  the  singer's  defense  against  those  who 
laugh  at  her  pretty  chagrin  is  —  it  seems  to  me 
— touching.  (See  Criole  Candjo,  page  826.) 

But  we  began  this  chapter  in  order  to  speak 
of  songs  that  bear  more  distinctly  than  any- 
thing yet  quoted  the  features  of  the  true  lay 
or  historical  narrative  song,  commemorating 
pointedly  and  in  detail  some  important  epi- 
sode in  the  history  of  the  community. 


IDJO. 

It  is  interesting  to  contrast  the  solemnity 
with  which  these  events  are  treated  when 
their  heroes  were  black,  and  the  broad  buf- 
foonery of  the  song  when  the  affair  it  cele- 
brates was  one  that  mainly  concerned  the 
masters.  Hear,  for  example,  through  all  the 
savage  simplicity  of  the  following  rhymeless 
lines,  the  melancholy  note  that  rises  and  falls 
but  never  intermits.  The  song  is  said  to  be 
very  old,  dating  from  the  last  century.  It  is 
still  sung,  but  the  Creole  gentleman  who  pro- 
cured it  for  me  from  a  former  slave  was  not 
able  to  transcribe  or  remember  the  air. 

LUBIN. 

Tremblant-terr'^  vini  'branle  moulin  ; 
Tonnerr'  chiel'^  tombe  bourle^  moulin; 

Tou'  moun"^  dans  moulin  la  peri. 
Temoins  vini  qui  vend'^  Libin. 
Ye  dit  Libin  mette  di  fe. 
Ye  hisse  safifauds  pou'  so  la  tetc.' 


1  Tremblement  de  terre  —  earthquake.       2  Ciel.       3  Bmlee.       4  Tout  le  monde.       5  Vendaient— sold,  betrayed. 
6  Echafaud.  So  la  tete ;  Creole  possessive  form  for  his  head. 


8 14  CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


"mistress  flew  into  a  passion." 


Saida  !  m'alle  mourri,  Saida ! 
Mo  zamis  di  comm'  ga  :  "  Libin, 
Faut  to  donn'  Zilie  to  biting" 
Cofaire'^  mo  sre  donnein  Zilie  ? 
Pou'  moin  Zilie  zamein  lave;-^ 


Zilie  zamein 


passe*  pou  mom. 


Saida  !  m'alle  mourri,  Sa'ida  ! 

An  earthquake  came  and  shook  the  mill ; 
The  heavens'  thunders  fell  and  burned  it; 
Every  soul  in  the  mill  perished. 
Witnesses  came  who  betrayed  Lubin. 
They  said  he  set  the  mill  on  fire. 
They  raised  a  scaffold  to  take  off  his  head. 

Saida !  I  am  going  to  die  ! 
My  friends  speak  in  this  way  :  "  Lubin, 
You  ought. to  give  Julia  your  plunder." 
Why  should  I  give  it  to  Julia? 
For  me  Julia  never  washed  clothes ; 
Julia  never  ironed  for  me. 

Sa'ida  !  I  am  going  to  die  ! 

Or  notice  again  the  stately  tone  of  lamenta- 
tion over  the  fate  of  a  famous  negro  insurrec- 
tionist, as  sung  by  old  Madeleine  of  St.  Ber- 
nard parish  to  the  same  Creole  friend  already 
mentioned,  who  kindly  wrote  down  the  lines 
on  the  spot  for  this  collection.  They  are 
fragmentary,  extorted  by  httles  from  the  shat- 
tered memory  of  the  ancient  crone.  Their 
allusion  to  the  Cabildo  places  their  origin  in 
the  days  when  that  old  colonial  council  ad- 
ministered Spanish  rule  over  the  province. 


OUARRA  ST.  MALO. 

Aie  !  zein  zens,  vini  fe  ouarra 
Pou'  pov'  St.  Malo  dans  I'embas ! 
Ye  9'asse  li  avec  ye  chien, 
Ye  tire  li  ein  coup  d'fizi, 

Ye  hale  li  la  cyprier, 
So  bras  ye  'tasse^  par  derrier, 
Ye  'tasse  so  la  main  divant; 
Ye  'mar re''  li  ape  queue  choual, 
Ye  trainein  li  zouqu'a  la  ville. 
Divant  miches  la  dans  Cabil'e 
Ye  quise"  li  li  fe  complot 
Pou'  coupe  cou  a  tout  ye  blancs. 
Ye  'mande  li  qui  so  comperes  ; 
P6v'_  St.  Malo  pas  di'  a-rien  ! 
Zize^  la  li  lir'  so  la  sentence, 
Et  pis^  li  fe  dresse  potence. 
Ye  hale  choual  —  g'arette  parti  — 
Pov'  St.  Maio  reste  pendi ! 
Eine  her  soleil  deza  levee 
Quand  ye  pend  li  si  la  levee. 
Ye  laisse  so  corps  balance 
Pou'  carancro  gagnein  manze. 

THE  DIRGE  OF  ST.  MALO. 

Alas  !  young  men,  come,  make  lament 
For  poor  St.  Malo  in  distress  ! 
They  chased,  they  hunted  him  with  dogs, 
They  fired  at  him  with  a  gun, 

They  hauled  him  from  the  cypress  swamp. 
His  arms  they  tied  behind  his  back, 
They  tied  his  hands  in  front  of  him ; 


1  Butin  :  literally  plunder,  but  used,  as  the  word  plunder  is  by  the  negro,  for  personal  property.       -  Pourquoi  faire. 
3  Washed  (clothes).        4  Ironed.        5  Attachee.       G  Amarre,  an  archaism,  common  to  negroes  and 
Acadians:  moored,  for  fastened.       7  Accusee.       SJuge.  Puis. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


They  tied  him  to  a  horse's  tail, 

They  dragged  him  up  into  the  town. 

Before  those  grand  Cabildo  men 

They  charged  that  he  had  made  a  plot 

To  cut  the  throats  of  all  the  whites. 

They  asked  him  who  his  comrades  were; 

Poor  St.  Malo  said  not  a  word ! 

The  judge  his  sentence  read  to  him, 

And  then  they  raised  the  gallows-tree. 

They  drew  the  horse  —  the  cart  moved  off— 

And  left  St.  Malo  hanging  there. 

The  sun  was  up  an  hour  high 

When  on  the  Levee  he  was  hung ; 

They  left  his  body  sv/inging  there, 

For  carrion  crows  to  feed  upon. 

It  would  be  curious,  did  the  limits  of  these 
pages  allow,  to  turn  from  such  an  outcry  of 
wild  mourning  as  this,  and  contrast  with  it 
the  clownisli  flippancy  with  which  the  great 
events  are  sung,  upon  whose  issue  from  time 
to  time  the  fate  of  the  whole  land  —  society, 
government,  the  fireside,  the  lives  of  thou- 
sands —  hung  in  agonies  of  suspense.  At  the 
same  time  it  could  not  escape  notice  how  com- 
pletely in  each  case,  while  how  differently  in 
the  two,  the  African  has  smitten  his  image 
into  every  line  :  in  the  one  sort,  the  white, 
uproUed  eyes  and  low  wail  of  the  savage  cap- 
tive, who  dares  not  lift  the  cry  of  mourning 
high  enough  for  the  jealous  ear  of  the  master; 
in  the  other,  the  antic  form,  the  grimacing 
face,  the  brazen  laugh,  and  self-abasing  con- 
fessions of  the  buffoon,  almost  within  the 
whisk  of  the  public  jailer's  lash.  I  have  be- 
fore me  two  songs  of  dates  almost  fifty  years 
apart.  The  one  celebrates  the  invasion  of 
Louisiana  by  the  British  under  Admiral  Coch- 
rane and  General  Pakenham  in  1814;  the 
other,  the  capture  and  occupation  of  New 
Orleans  by  Commodore  Farragut  and  Gen- 
eral Butler  in  1862. 

It  was  on  the  morning  of  the  twenty-third 
of  December,  18 14,  that  the  British  columns, 
landing  from  a  fleet  of  barges  and  hurrying 
along  the  narrow  bank  of  a  small  canal  in  a 
swamp  forest,  gained  a  position  in  the  open 
plain  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi  only  six 
miles  below  New  Orleans,  and  with  no  de- 
fenses to  oppose  them  between  their  vantage- 
ground  and  the  city.  The  surprise  was  so 
complete  that,  though  they  issued  from  the 
woods  an  hour  before  noon,  it  was  nearly 
three  hours  before  the  news  reached  the  town. 
But  at  nightfall  General  Jackson  fell  upon 
them  and  fought  in  the  dark  the  engagement 
which  the  song  commemorates,  the  indecisive 
battle  of  Chalmette. 

The  singer  ends  thus  : 

"  Fizi  z'Angle  ye  fe  bim  !  bim  ! 
Carabin  Kaintock  ye  fe  zim  !  zim  ! 
Mo  di'  moin,  sauve  to  la  peau ! 
Mo  zete  corps  au  bord  do  I'eau  ; 
Quand  mo  rive  li  te  fe  clair. 


Madam'  li  prend'  ein  coup  d'col^re ; 
Li  fe  donn'  moin  ein  quat'  piquie, 
Passeque  mo  pas  sivi  mouchie; 
Mais  moin,  mo  vo  mie  quat'  piquie 
Passe  ein  coup  d'fizi  z'Angle  !  " 

The  English  muskets  went  bim  !  bim  ! 
Kentucky  rifles  went  zim  !  zim  ! 
I  said  to  myself,  save  your  skin ! 
I  scampered  along  the  water's  edge; 
When  I  got  back  it  was  day-break. 
Mistress  flew  into  a  passion  ; 
She  had  me  whipped  at  the  '  four  stakes,' 
Because  I  didn't  stay  with  master ; 
But  the  '  four  stakes  '  for  me  is  better  than 
A  musket  shot  from  an  Englishman." 

The  story  of  Farragut's  victory  and  Butler's 
advent  in  April,  1862,  is  sung  with  the  still 
hghter  heart  of  one  in  whose  day  the  "quatre 
piquets  "  was  no  longer  a  feature  of  the  cala- 
boose. Its  refrain  is  : 

"  An-he  ! 
Qui  9a  qui  rive  ? 
C'est  Ferraguitt  et  p'i  Botlair, 
Qui  rive." 

The  story  is  long  and  silly,  much  in  the 
humor  of 

"  Hark !  hark  ! 
The  dogs  do  bark." 

We  will  lay  it  on  the  table. 

IV. 

THE  VOODOOS. 

The  dance  and  song  entered  into  the  negro 
worship.  That  worship  was  as  dark  and  hor- 
rid as  bestialized  savagery  could  make  the 
adoration  of  serpents.  So  revolting  was  it, 
and  so  morally  hideous,  that  even  in  the  West 
Indian  French  possessions  a  hundred  years 
ago,  with  the  slave-trade  in  full  blast  and  the 
West  Indian  planter  and  slave  what  they 
were,  the  orgies  of  the  Voodoos  were  forbid- 
den. Yet  both  there  and  in  Louisiana  they 
were  practiced. 

The  Aradas,  St.  Mery  tells  us,  introduced 
them.  They  brought  them  from  their  homes  be- 
yond the  Slave  Coast,  one  of  the  most  dreadfully 
benighted  regions  of  all  Africa.  He  makes 
the  word  Vaudaux.  In  Louisiana  it  is  written 
Voudou  and  Voodoo,  and  is  often  changed 
on  the  negro's  lips  to  Hoodoo.  It  is  the 
name  of  an  imaginary  being  of  vast  supernat- 
ural powers  residing  in  the  form  of  a  harm- 
less snake.  This  spiritual  influence  or  potentate 
is  the  recognized  antagonist  and  opposite  of 
Obi,  the  great  African  manitou  or  deity,  or 
him  whom  the  Congoes  vaguely  generalize 
as  Zombi.  In  Louisiana,  as  I  have  been  told 
by  that  learned  Creole  scholar  the  late  Alex- 
ander Dimitry,  Voodoo  bore  as  a  title  of 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


817 


greater  solemnity  the  addition- 
al name  of  Maignan,  and  that 
even  in  the  Calinda  dance, 
which  he  had  witnessed  in- 
numerable times,  was  some- 
times heard,  at  the  height  of 
its  frenzy,  the  invocation — 

"A'ie!  Aie! 
Voodoo  Magnan  !  " 

The  worship  of  Voodoo  is 
paid  to  a  snake  kept  in  a  box. 
The  worshipers  are  not  merely 
a  sect,  but  in  some  rude,  sav- 
age way  also  an  order.  A  man 
and  woman  chosen  from  their 
own  number  to  be  the  oracles 
of  the  serpent  deity  are  called 
the  king  and  queen.  The 
queen  is  the  more  important 
of  the  two,  and  even  in  the 
present  dilapidated  state  of  the 
worship  in  Louisiana,  where 
the  king's  office  has  almost  or 
quite  disappeared,  the  queen 
is  still  a  person  of  great  note. 

She  reigns  as  long  as  she 
continues  to  live.  She  comes 
to  power  not  by  inheritance, 
but  by  election  or  its  barbarous 
equivalent.  Chosen  for  such 
qualities  as  would  give  her  a 
natural  supremacy,  personal 
attractions  among  the  rest,  and 
ruling  over  superstitious  fears 
and  desires  of  every  fierce  and 
ignoble  sort,  she  wields  no  triv- 
ial influence.  I  once  saw,  in 
her  extreme  old  age,  the  famed 
Marie  Laveau.  Her  dwelling 
was  in  the  quadroon  quarter 
of  New  Orleans,  but  a  step  or 
two  from  Congo  Square,  a 
small  adobe  cabin  just  off  the 
sidewalk,  scarcely  higher  than 
its  close  board  fence,  whose 
batten  gate  yielded  to  the 
touch  and  revealed  the  crazy 
doors  and  windows  spread 
wide  to  the  warm  air,  and  one 
or  two  tawny  faces  within,  whose  expression 
was  divided  between  a  pretense  of  contemptu- 
ous inattention  and  a  frowning  resentment  of 
the  intrusion.  In  the  center  of  a  small  room 
whose  ancient  cypress  floor  was  worn  with 
scrubbing  and  sprinkled  with  crumbs  of  soft 
brick — a  Creole  affectation  of  superior  clean- 
liness— sat,  quaking  with  feebleness  in  an  ill- 
looking  old  rocking-chair,  her  body  bowed, 
and  her  wild,  gray  witch's  tresses  hanging 
about  her  shriveled,  yellow  neck,  the  queen 
Vol.  XXXL— 8s. 


of  the  Voodoos.  Three  generations  of  her 
children  were  within  the  faint  beckon  of  her 
helpless,  waggling  wrist  and  fingers.  They 
said  she  was  over  a  hundred  years  old,  and 
there  was  nothing  to  cast  doubt  upon  the 
statement.  She  had  shrunken  away  from  her 
skin ;  it  was  like  a  turtle's.  Yet  withal  one 
could  hardly  help  but  see  that  the  face,  now 
so  withered,  had  once  been  handsome  and 
commanding.  There  was  still  a  faint  shadow 
of  departed  beauty  on  the  forehead,  the  spark 


8i8 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


of  an  old  fire  in  the  sunken,  glistening  eyes, 
and  a  vestige  of  imperiousness  in  the  fine, 
slightly  aquiline  nose,  and  even  about  her  silent, 
woe-begone  mouth.  Her  grandson  stood  by, 
an  uninteresting  quadroon  between  forty  and 
fifty  years  old,  looking  strong,  empty-minded, 
and  trivial  enough;  but  his  mother,  her  daugh- 
ter, was  also  present,  a  woman  of  some  seventy 
years,  and  a  most  striking  and  majestic  figure. 
In  features,  stature,  and  bearing  she  was  regal. 
One  had  but  to  look  on  her,  impute  her  brill- 
iancies —  too  untamable  and  severe  to  be  called 
charms  or  graces  —  to  her  mother,  and  remem- 
ber what  New  Orleans  was  long  years  ago,  to 
understand  how  the  name  of  Marie  Laveau 
should  have  driven  itself  inextricably  into  the 
traditions  of  the  town  and  the  times.  Had 
this  visit  been  postponed  a  few  months  it  w^ould 
have  been  too  late.  Marie  Laveau  is  dead;  Mal- 
vina  Latour  is  queen.  As  she  appeared  presid- 
ing over  a  Voodoo  ceremony  on  the  night  of 
the  23d  of  June,  1884,  she  is  described  as  a 
bright  mulattress  of  about  forty-eight,  of  "ex- 
tremely handsome  figure,"  dignified  bearing, 
and  a  face  indicative  of  a  comparatively  high 
order  of  intelligence.  She  wore  a  neat  blue, 
white-dotted  calico  gown,  and  a  "  brilliant 
tignon  (turban)  gracefully  tied." 

It  is  pleasant  to  say  that  this  worship,  in 
Louisiana,  at  least,  and  in  comparison  with 
what  it  once  w^as,  has  grown  to  be  a  rather 
trivial  afiair.  The  practice  of  its  midnight  forest 
rites  seemed  to  sink  into  inanition  along  with 
Marie  Laveau.  It  long  ago  diminished  m  fre- 
quency to  once  a  year,  the  chosen  night  al- 
ways being  the  Eve  of  St.  John.  For  several 
years  past  even  these  annual  celebrations  have 
been  suspended  ;  but  in  the  summer  of  1884 
they  were  —  let  it  be  hoped,  only  for  the 
once  —  resumed. 

When  the  queen  decides  that  such  a  cele- 
bration shall  take  place,  she  appoints  a  night 
for  the  gathering,  and  some  remote,  secluded 
spot  in  the  forest  for  the  rendezvous.  Thither 
all  the  worshipers  are  summoned.  St.  Mery, 
careless  of  the  power  of  the  scene,  draws  in 
practical,  unimaginative  lines  the  picture  of 
such  a  gathering  in  St.  Domingo,  in  the  times 
when  the  '^veritable  Vaudaiix''' lost  but 
little  of  the  primitive  African  character.  The 
worshipers  are  met,  decked  with  kerchiefs 
more  or  less  numerous,  red  being  everywhere 
the  predominating  color.  The  king,  abun- 
dantly adorned  with  them,  wears  one  of  pure 
red  about  his  forehead  as  a  diadem.  A  blue 
ornamental  cord  completes  his  insignia.  The 
queen,  in  simple  dress  and  wearing  a  red 
cord  and  a  heavily  decorated  belt,  is  beside 
him  near  a  rude  altar.  The  silence  of  mid- 
night is  overhead,  the  gigantic  forms  and 
shadows  and  still,  dank  airs  of  the  tropical 


forest  close  in  around,  and  on  the  altar,  in  a 
small  box  ornamented  with  little  tinkling 
bells,  lies,  unseen,  the  living  serpent.  The 
worshipers  have  begun  their  devotions  to  it 
by  presenting  themselves  before  it  in  a  body, 
and  uttering  professions  of  their  fidelity  and 
belief  in  its  power.  They  cease,  and  now  the 
royal  pair,  in  tones  of  parental  authority  and 
protection,  are  extolling  the  great  privilege 
of  being  a  devotee,  and  inviting  the  faithful 
to  consult  the  oracle.  The  crowd  makes  room, 
and  a  single  petitioner  draws  near.  He  is  the 
senior  member  of  the  order.  His  prayer  is 
made.  The  king  becomes  deeply  agitated  by 
the  presence  within  him  of  the  spirit  invoked. 
Suddenly  he  takes  the  box  from  the  altar  and 
sets  it  on  the  ground.  The  queen  steps  upon 
it  and  with  convulsive  movements  utters  the 
answers  of  the  deity  beneath  her  feet.  An- 
other and  another  suppliant,  approaching  in 
the  order  of  seniority,  present,  singly,  their 
petitions,  and  humbly  or  exultingly,  according 
to  the  nature  of  the  responses,  which  hangs 
on  the  fierce  caprice  of  the  priestess,  accept 
these  utterances  and  make  way  for  the  next, 
with  his  prayer  of  fear  or  covetousness,  love, 
jealousy.petty  spite  or  deadly  malice.  Atlength 
the  last  petitioner  is  answered.  Now  a  circle 
is  formed,  the  caged  snake  is  restored  to  the 
altar,  and  the  humble  and  multifarious  obla- 
tions of  the  worshipers  are  received,  to  be 
devoted  not  only  to  the  trivial  expenses  of 
this  worship,  but  also  to  the  relief  of  members 
of  the  order  whose  distresses  call  for  such  aid. 
Again,  the  royal  ones  are  speaking,  issuing 
orders  for  execution  in  the  future,  orders  that 
have  not  always  in  view,  mildly  says  St.  Mery, 
good  order  and  public  tranquillity.  Presently 
the  ceremonies  become  more  forbidding. 
They  are  taking  a  horrid  oath,  smearing  their 
lips  with  the  blood  of  some  slaughtered  ani- 
mal, and  swearing  to  suffer  death  rather  than 
disclose  any  secret  of  the  order,  and  to  inflict 
death  on  any  who  may  commit  such  treason. 
Now  a  new  applicant  for  membership  steps 
into  their  circle,  there  are  a  few  trivial  for- 
malities, and  the  Voodoo  dance  begins.  The 
postulant  dances  frantically  in  the  middle  of 
the  ring,  only  pausing  from  time  to  time  to 
receive  heavy  alcoholic  draughts  in  great 
haste  and  return  more  wildly  to  his  leapings 
and  writhings  until  he  falls  in  convulsions. 
He  is  lifted,  restored,  and  presently  conducted 
to  the  altar,  takes  his  oath,  and  by  a  ceremo- 
nial stroke  from  one  of  the  sovereigns  is  admit- 
ted a  full  participant  in  the  privileges  and 
obligations  of  the  devilish  freemasonry.  But 
the  dance  goes  on  about  the  snake.  The  con- 
tortions of  the  upper  part  of  the  body,  especially 
of  the  neck  and  shoulders,  are  such  as  threaten 
to  dislocate  them.  The  queen  shakes  the  box 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


819 


i'l"". 


m mm 


MARIE  LAVEAU. 


and  tinkles  its  bells,  the  rum-bottle  gurgles,  the 
chant  alternates  between  king  and  chorus  — 


Eh!  eh!  Bomba,  hone 
Canga  bafio  tay, 
Canga  moon  day  lay 
Canga  do  keelah, 
Canga  li  " 

*  "  Hen  !  hen 


hone  I 


There  are  swoonings  and  ravings,  nervous 
tremblings  beyond  control,  incessant  writhings 
and  turnings,  tearing  of  garments,  even  biting 
of  the  flesh  —  every  imaginable  invention  of 
the  devil. 

St.  Mery  tells  us  of  another  dance  invented 
"  in  the  West  Indies  by  a  negro,  analogous  to 

in  St.  Mery's  spelling  of  it  for  French  pronunciation.    As  he  further  describes  the  sound 
m  a  toot-note,  it  must  have  been  a  horrid  grunt. 


820 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


the  Voodoo  dance,  but  more  rapid,  and  in 
which  dancers  had  been  known  to  fall  dead. 
This  was  the  "  Dance  of  Don  Pedro."  The 
best  efforts  of  police  had,  in  his  day,  only 
partially  suppressed  it.  Did  it  ever  reach 
Louisiana  ?  Let  us,  at  a  venture,  say  no. 

To  what  extent  the  Voodoo  worship  still 
obtains  here  would  be  difficult  to  say  with  cer- 
tainty. The  affair  of  June,  1884,  as  described 
by  Messrs.  Augustin  and  Whitney,  eye-wit- 
nesses, was  an  orgy  already  grown  horrid 
enough  when  they  turned  their  backs  upon 
it.  It  took  place  at  a  wild  and  lonely  spot 
where  the  dismal  cypress  swamp  behind  New 
Orleans  meets  the  waters  of  Lake  Pontchar- 
train  in  a  wilderness  of  cypress  stumps  and 
rushes.  It  would  be  hard  to  find  in  nature  a 
more  painfully  desolate  region.  Here  in  a 
fisherman's  cabin  sat  the  Voodoo  worshipers 
cross-legged  on  the  floor  about  an  Indian 
basket  of  herbs  and  some  beans,  some  bits  of 
bone,  some  oddly  wrought  bunches  of  feathers, 
and  some  saucers  of  small  cakes.  The  queen 
presided,  sitting  on  the  only  chair  in  the  room. 
There  was  no  king,  no  snake —  at  least  none 
visible  to  the  onlookers.  Two  drummers  beat 
with  their  thumbs  on  gourds  covered  with 
sheepskin,  and  a  white-wooled  old  man 
scraped  that  hideous  combination  of  banjo 
and  violin,  whose  head  is  covered  with  rat- 
tlesnake skin,  and  of  which  the  Chinese  are 
the  makers  and  masters.  There  was  singing — 

M'alle  couri  dans  deser  "  ("  I  am  going  into 
the  wilderness "),  a  chant  and  refrain  not 
worth  the  room  they  would  take  —  and  there 
was  frenzy  and  a  circling  march,  wild  shouts, 
delirious  gesticulations  and  posturings,  drink- 
ing, and  amongst  other  frightful  nonsense  the 
old  trick  of  making  fire  blaze  from  the  mouth 
by  spraying  alcohol  from  it  upon  the  flame 
of  a  candle. 

But  whatever  may  be  the  quantity  of  the 
Voodoo  worship  left  in  Louisiana,  its  super- 
stitions are  many  and  are  everywhere.  Its 
charms  are  resorted  to  by  the  maHcious,  the 
jealous,  the  revengeful,  or  the  avaricious,  or 
held  in  terror,  not  by  the  timorous  only,  but 
by  the  strong,  the  courageous,  the  desperate. 
To  find  under  his  mattress  an  acorn  hollowed 
out,  stuffed  with  the  hair  of  some  dead  person, 
pierced  with  four  holes  on  four  sides,  and  two 


small  chicken  feathers  drawn  through  them 
so  as  to  cross  inside  the  acorn ;  or  to  discover 
on  his  door-sill  at  daybreak  a  little  box  con- 
taining a  dough  or  waxen  heart  stuck  full  of 
pins  ;  or  to  hear  that  his  avowed  foe  or  rival 
has  been  pouring  cheap  champagne  in  the 
four  corners  of  Congo  Square  at  midnight, 
when  there  was  no  moon,  will  strike  more 
abject  fear  into  the  heart  of  many  a  stalwart 
negro  or  melancholy  quadroon  than  to  face 
a  leveled  revolver.  And  it  is  not  only  the 
colored  man  that  holds  to  these  practices  and 
fears.  Many  a  white  Creole  gives  them  full 
credence.  What  wonder,  when  African  Cre- 
oles were  the  nurses  of  so  nearly  all  of  them? 
Many  shrewd  men  and  women,  generally 
colored  persons,  drive  a  trade  in  these  charms 
and  in  oracular  directions  for  their  use  or 
evasion ;  many  a  Creole  —  white  as  well  as 
other  tints  —  female,  too,  as  well  as  male — 
will  pay  a  Voodoo  "  monteure  "  to  "  make  a 
work,"  i.  e.y  to  weave  a  spell,  for  the  prosper- 
ing of  some  scheme  or  wish  too  ignoble  to  be 
prayed  for  at  any  shrine  inside  the  church. 
These  milder  incantations  are  performed 
w^ithin  the  witch's  or  wizard's  own  house,  and 
are  made  up,  for  the  most  part,  of  a  little 
pound  cake,  some  lighted  candle  ends,  a  little 
syrup  of  sugar-cane,  pins,  knitting-needles, 
and  a  trifle  of  anisette.  But  fear  naught ;  an 
Obi  charm  will  enable  you  to  smile  defiance 
against  all  such  mischief;  or  if  you  will  but 
consent  to  be  a  magician,  it  is  they,  the  Voo- 
doos, one  and  all,  who  will  hold  you  in  abso- 
lute terror.  Or,  easier,  a  frizzly  chicken !  If  you 
have  on  your  premises  a  frizzly  chicken,  you 
can  lie  down  and  laugh — it  is  a  checkmate ! 

A  planter  once  found  a  Voodoo  charm,  or 
ouanga  (wongah) ;  this  time  it  was  a  bit  of 
cotton  cloth  folded  about  three  cow-peas  and 
some  breast  feathers  of  a  barn-yard  fowl,  and 
covered  with  a  tight  wrapping  of  thread. 
When  he  proposed  to  take  it  to  New  Orleans 
his  slaves  were  full  of  consternation.  "  Marse 
Ed,  ef  ye  go  on  d'boat  wid  dat-ah,  de  boat'U 
sink  wi'  yer.  Fore  d'Lord,  it  will ! "  For  some 
reason  it  did  not.  Here  is  a  genuine  Voodoo 
song,  given  me  by  Lafcadio  Hearn,  though 
what  the  words  mean  none  could  be  more 
ignorant  of  than  the  present  writer.  They  are 
rendered  phonetically  in  French. 


^1 


He  -  ron     man  -  de,     He  -  ron     man  -  de,      Ti  -  gui  li 


pa,     He  -  ron     man  -  de,      Ti  -  gui 

D.  C. 


1^1 


pa  -  pa.    He  -  ron   man -de.     He  -   ron   man  -  d^,     He  -   ron   man-d^,    Do        dan    go  -  do. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


821 


PLANTER   AND   VOODOO  CHARM. 


And  another  phrase  :  "Ah  tingouai  ye,  Ah 
tingouai  ye,  Ah  ouai  ya.  Ah  ouai  ya,  Ah  tin- 
gouai ye,  Do  se  dan  go-do,  Ah  tingouai  ye," 
etc. 

V. 

SONGS  OF  WOODS  AND  WATERS. 

A  LAST  page  to  the  songs  of  the  chase  and 
of  the  boat.  The  circumstances  that  produced 
them  have  disappeared.  There  was  a  time, 
not  so  long  ago,  when  traveUng  in  Louisiana 
was  done  almost  wholly  by  means  of  the 
paddle,  the  oar,  or  the  "  sweep."  Every  plan- 
tation had  its  river  or  bayou  front,  and  every 
planter  his  boat  and  skilled  crew  of  black 


oarsmen.  The  throb  of  their  song  measured 
the  sweep  of  the  oars,  and  as  their  bare  or 
turbaned  heads  and  shining  bodies,  naked  to 
the  waist,  bowed  forward  and  straightened 
back  in  ceaseless  alternation,  their  strong 
voices  chanted  the  praise  of  the  silent,  broad- 
hatted  master  who  sat  in  the  stern.  Now  and 
then  a  line  was  interjected  in  manly  boast  to 
their  own  brawn,  and  often  the  praise  of 
the  master  softened  off  into  tender  laudations 
of  the  charms  of  some  black  or  tawny  Zilie, 
'Zabette,  or  Zalli.  From  the  treasures  of  the 
old  chest  already  mentioned  comes  to  my 
hand,  from  the  last  century  most  likely,  on  a 
ragged  yellow  sheet  of  paper,  written  with  a 
green  ink,  one  of  these  old  songs.  It  would 


822 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


take  up  much  room;  I  have  made  a  close 
translation  of  its  stanzas  : 

rowers'  song. 

Sing,  lads  ;  our  master  bids  us  sing. 
For  master  cry  out  loud  and  strong. 
The  water  with  the  long  oar  strike. 
Sing,  lads,  and  let  us  haste  along. 

'Tis  for  our  master  we  will  sing. 
We'll  sing  for  our  young  mistresses. 
And  sweethearts  we  must  not  forget  — 
Zoe,  Merente,  Zabelle,  Louise. 

Sin-g,  fellows,  for  our  own  true  loves. 
My  lottery  prize  !  Zo€,  my  belle  ! 
She's  like  a  wild  young  doe,  she  knows 
The  way  to  jump  and  dance  so  well! 


Black  diamonds  are  her  bright,  black  eyes, 
Her  teeth  and  lilies  are  alike. 
Sing,  fellows,  for  my  true  love,  and 
The  water  with  the  long  oar  strike. 

See  !  see  !  the  town  !   Hurrah  !  hurrah  ! 
Master  returns  in  pleasant  mood. 
He's  going  to  treat  his  boys  all  'round. 
Hurrah  !  hurrah  for  master  good  ! 

From  the  same  treasury  comes  a  hunting 
song.  Each  stanza  begins  and  ends  with  the 
loud  refrain  :  '-'-Bombotila  I  bomboula  /  "  Some 
one  who  has  studied  African  tongues  may 
be  able  to  say  whether  this  word  is  one  with 
Bamboula,  the  name  of  the  dance  and  of  the 
drum  that  dominates  it.   Otila  seems  to  be  an 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


823 


infinitive  termination  of  many  Congo  verbs, 
and  boula,  De  Lanzieres  says,  means  to  beat. 
However,  the  dark  hunters  of  a  hundred  years 
ago  knew,  and  between  their  outcries  of  the 
loud,  rumbUng  word  sang,  in  this  song,  their 
mutual  exhortation  to  rise,  take  guns,  fill 
powder-horns,  load  up,  call  dogs,  make  haste 
and  be  off  to  the  woods  to  find  game  for 
master's  table  and  their  own  grosser  cuisine ; 
for  the  one,  deer,  squirrels,  rabbits,  birds ;  for 
the  other,  chat  ones  (raccoons),  that  make 
"  si  bon  gomho  "  (such  good  gumbo !).  "  Don't 
fail  to  kill  them,  boys, —  and  the  tiger-cats  that 
eat  men ;  and  if  we  meet  a  bear,  we'll  van- 
quish him!  Bomboula  !  bomboula!  "  The 
lines  have  a  fine  African  ring  in  them,  but  — 
one  mustn't  print  everything. 

Another  song,  of  wood  and  water  both, 
though  only  the  water  is  mentioned,  I  have 
direct  from  former  Creole  negro  slaves.  It  is 
a  runaway's  song  of  defiance  addressed  to  the 
high  sheriff  Fleuriau  (Charles  Jean  Baptiste 
Fleuriau,  Alguazil  mayor),  a  Creole  of  the 
Cabildo  a  hundred  and  fifteen  years  ago.  At 
least  one  can  think  so,  for  the  name  is  not  to 
be  found  elsewhere. 


of  operations,  and  seeking  his  adventures  not 
so  far  from  the  hen-coop  and  pig-pen  as  rigid 
principles  would  have  dictated.  Now  that  he 
is  free,  he  is  willing  to  reveal  these  little  pleas- 
an  tries — as  one  of  the  bygones — to  the  eager 
historian.  Much  nocturnal  prowling  was  done 
on  the  waters  of  the  deep,  forest-darkened 
bayous,  in  pirogues  (dug-outs).  For  secret 
signals  to  accomplices  on  shore  they  resorted 
to  singing.  What  is  so  innocent  as  music! 
The  words  were  in  some  African  tongue.  We 
have  one  of  these  songs  from  the  negroes  them- 
selves, with  their  own  translation  and  their 
own  assurance  that  the  translation  is  correct. 
The  words  have  a  very  Congo-ish  sound.  The 
Congo  tongue  knows  no  r;  but  the  fact  is  fa- 
miliar that  in  America  the  negro  interchanges 
the  sounds  of  r  and  /  as  readily  as  does  the 
Chinaman.  We  will  use  both  an  English  and 
a  French  spelling.  (De  Zab,  page  827.) 

The  whole  chant  consists  of  but  six  words 
besides  a  single  conjunction.  It  means,  its 
singers  avowed,  Out  from  under  the  trees 
our  boat  moves  into  the  open  water — bring 
us  large  game  and  small  game !  "  De  zab 
sounds  like  des  arbs,  and  they  called  it  French, 


C'est  vrai  ye  pas  ca  -  pab'  pran  moin 
In   -   deed  fo'    true   dey  can't  catch    me ! 


Zi  -  ne  -  ral 
Gen  -  e   -  ral 


pas  ca  -  pab'  pran  moin 
true   dey     can't  catch  me  ! 


2.  Yen  a  ein  counan  si  la  mer 
C'est  vrai,  etc. 


Bis. 


2.  Dey  got*  one  schooner  out  at  sea  f  „  • 
Indeed  fo'  true,  etc.  ^  ' 


Sometimes  the  black  man  found  it  more 
convenient  not  to  run  away  himself,  but  to 
make  other  articles  of  property  seem  to  escape 
from  custody.  He  ventured  to  forage  on  his 
own  account,  retaining  his  cabin  as  a  base 


but  the  rest  they  claimed  as  good  "  Affykin.'* 
We  cannot  say.  We  are  sappers  and  miners 
in  this  quest,  not  philologists.  When  they 
come  on  behind,  if  they  ever  think  it  worth 
their  while  to  do  so,  the  interpretation  of  this 
strange  song  may  be  not  more  difficult  than 
that  of  the  famous  inscription  discovered  by 
Mr.  Pickwick.  But,  as  well  as  the  present 
writer  can  know,  all  that  have  been  given 
here  are  genuine  antiques. 


*  " Dey  got "  is  a  vulgarism  of  Louisiana  Creoles,  white  and  colored,  for  "There  is."    It  is  a  transfer 
into  English  of  the  French  idiom  II y  a. 


824 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


QUAND   MO  'TE. 


Arr,  by  Miss  M.  L.  Bartlett. 


(  Quand  mo  'te       dans   grand  chi-min 
<   Mo    'man-d^       quel   heuie   li  y6, 
f  Mo    'man-de      mou  -  choi'    ta  -  Sac, 


Mo  con-  tre  nion  vie  pa  -  pa. 
Li       dit  moin    mi  -  di      pas  -  se. 

Li      don  moin   mou-  [Omit  ]      choi  Ma-dras. 


I    T.st  time. 


I    id  time. 


3^ 


3^ 


 ^ — V=-  

Prise    to  -  bac     jam  -  bette  a      cou  -  teau,      Taf  -  fia  doux  pas  - 


SI  -  rop. 


si  -  rop. 


NEC  PAS   CAPA'  MARCHE. 

Arr.  by  Miss  M.  L.  Bartlett. 


Allegro 


at  


1.  Neg  pas  ca  -  pa'  mar-ch(^  sans  ma   is  dans  poche,  c'est  pou  vo-ld  poule. 

2.  Millate  pas  ca-  pa'  mar-che  sans  la  corde  dans  poche,  c'est  pou  vole  choual. 

3.  Blanc  pas  ca  -  pa'  mar  che  sans  la'zen  dans  poche,  c'est  pou  vo-le  filles. 


-pt=^  •  


After  last  verse.^ 


ff=  =E- 

•  c^-?  S  

r«  7n  P** 

-m — P — P  7  ■  -J-g- 

»  m  m 

-  r  - 

:— t-  1-1 

m 

AH  !  SUZETTE. 


Arr.  by  Madame  L,  Lejeune. 


Ah !  Su-zette, 


Su-zette    to  pas  chere. 


Ah  !    Su-zette,  chfere  a  -  mie, 


-A  -*  


Fine. 


to    pas    lai  -  mein  moin. 


1.  M'al  -  le    haut   mon-tagne  za-mie, 

2.  Mo    cour-ri     dans  bois,  za-mie. 


M'al  -  Id  cou  -pd 
Pou'  tou  -  €  zo- 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


825 


D.  C. 


canne  za  -  mie, 
zo,     za  -  mie, 


M'al  -  le 
Pou' . . . 


Ta'-zent,  chfere  a  -  mie, 
I'a'-zent,  chfere  a  -  mie. 


Pou'  po'  -  ti  donne  toi. 
Pou'  mo  bailie  Su-zette. 


POV  PITI   MOMZEL  ZIZI. 


Arr,  by  Mme.  L.  Lejeuke. 


Pov'    pi-ti   Momzel  Zi  -  zi,  Pov'     pi- ti   Mom-zel   Zi  -  zi,  Li     gag-in   bo  -  bo,  bo  -  bo 


mp 


^ — 3 — -i— 5" 


9: — a — ^ — 5 


dhn. 


mf 


Dans     so  pi  -  ti     ker     a       li.         Pov'   pi  -  ti    Mom-zel  Zi  -  zi,         Pov'    pi  -  ti    Mom-zel  Zi  -  zi, 


After  the  Closing  Stanza  omit  to 


Li    gag-in  bo  -  bo, 


gag-m  DO  -  DO,  bo   -   bo       Dans  so  pi-ti    ker   a     11.  i.  Cal-a- Ion  po  -  te  ma-drasse  Li  po- 

2.  D'amour  quand  pot^  la  chaine.  Adieu, 


ag-4-  J--8=l: 


1^1 


ziX  zii 


dim. 


D.  S. 


826 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


Ending  of  Re/rain  after  the  Closing  Stanza. 


dim. 


bo     li  gag-nin  bo  -  bo,    bo  -  bo,          bo  -  bo,   Li  gagnin  bo  -  bo, . . .     dans  k^r  a 


1.  Dans  tan      mote  zene         Mo  zamein  zongl^,  bon  Die !   A   9'tair  m'a-pe  vi  -  ni   vie,      M'a  -  pe  zongle,  bon 

2.  Dans  tan      mo  te  nesclave   Mo  servis  momaite,  bon  Dje  !  A  9'tair  mo  be-soin  re  -  pos,    Mo  sers  ton  moune,boa 


i 


Dje  !  M'ape  zon-gle  bon  tan  qui  pas-  s^,  M'ape  zongle  bon  tan  qui  pas-se,  M'a-pe  zon-gld  bon  tan  qui  pas-se. 
Dje !  M'ap^  zon-gle,  etc. 


CRIOLE  CANDJO. 


A  ndante. 


H.  E.  Krehbiel. 


1.  In      zou'        in      zene       Cri  -  ole        Can  -  djo.      Belle  pas    -  b'lanc       dan  -  dan  la 

2.  Mo    cour    -  ri       dans     youn  bois        vol  -  sm ;     Mais  Cri    -    ole     la        prend  meme  ci 


Una  Cor  da. 


=1-- 


yo,  Li      te     tout  tans     a   -   p^    dire,  "  Vi  -  ni,    za  -  mi,    pou' nous  rire." 

min  Et    tous  tans    li       m'a  -  pd    dire,  "  Vi  -  ni,  etc. 


CREOLE  SLAVE  SONGS. 


827 


-j^ —  ^  -  ^        r    r — 

-(•     ^     f*^   -'^       >   -7^^—.  h 

l^-^-v^--^ — 1 — 

Non,  mi-  chd,  r 

n'pas  ou  -  le 

ri    -    re,    moin.        Non,  mi  -  che. 

m'pas  ou  -  1^ 
<J  1 

^  h-bi^  fc 

ri     -      -  re. 

(J  ^  *         <«    <  ' 

-     p  =q  ^  t=.  0  p — p. 

-1 

g  ^-:^_pz==rr: 

r  ^ 

— 1 

r  r 

Non,  mi  -  chd,  m'pas  ou  -  le     ri    -    re,   moin,         Non,  mi  -  che,  m'pasou  -  le  ri 


-J-c  ^--jj-c  


3? 


=11 


3.  Mais  li  te  tant  cicane  moi, 
Pou'  li  te  quitte  moin  youn  fois 
Mo  te  'blize  pou  li  dire, 

Oui,  miche,  mo  oule  rire. 
Oui  miche,  etc. 

4.  Zaut  tous  qu'ap'es  rire  moin  la  bas, 
Si  zaut  te  conne  Candjo  la, 

Qui  belle  fagon  li  pou'  rire, 
Dje  pini  moin !  zaut  s're  dire, 
*'  Oui,  miche,"  etc. 

One  day  one  young  Creole  candio, 
Mo'  fineh  dan  sho  nuf  white  beau. 
Kip  all  de  time  meckin'  free  — 
"  Swithawt,  meek  merrie  wid  me." 
Naw,  sah,  I  dawn't  want  meek  merrie,  me. 
Naw,  sah,  I  dawn't  want  meek  merrie." 


I  gcf  teck  walk  in  wood  close  by; 

But  Creole  tek'  sem  road,  and  try 
All  time,  all  time,  to  meek  free  — 
"Swithawt,  meek  merrie  wid  me." 

"  Naw,  sah,  I  dawn't  want  meek  meirrie,  me. 

Naw,  sah,  I  dawn't  want  meek  merrie." 

But  him  slide  roun'  an'  roun'  dis  chile, 
Tell,  jis'  fo'  sheck  'im  off  lill  while, 

Me,  I  w^as  bleedze  fo'  say,  "  Shoo  ! 

If  I'll  meek  merrie  wid  you? 
O,  yass,  I  ziss  leave  meek  merrie,  me ; 
Yass,  seh,  I  ziss  leave  meek  merrie." 

You-alls  w'at  laugh  at  me  so  well, 

I  wish  you'd  knowed  dat  Creole  swell, 

Wid  all  'is  swit,  smilin'  trick'. 

'Pon  my  soul !  you'd  done  say,  quick, 
"  O,  yass,  I  ziss  leave  meek  merrie,  me ; 
Yass,  seh,  I  ziss  leave  meek  merrie." 


Dfi  ZAB. 


Arr.  by  Miss  M.  L.  Bartlett. 


Day  zab,  day  zab,  day  koo  -  noo  wi  wi.  Day  zab,  day  zab,  day  koo-noo  wi  wi,  Koo-noo 
D6     zab,  de  zab,  de    kou  -  nou  ouaie,  ouaie,  De    zab,   de    zab,    de       kou-nou  ouaie,  ouaie,  Kou-nou 


--=r 


wi       wi      wi      wi,     Koo-noo  wi      wi      wi      wi,     Koo-noo   wi      wi     wi    mom  -  zah   Mom- 

ouaie,  ouaie,  ouaie,  ouaie,  Kounou  ouaie,  ouaie,  ouaie,  ouaie.  Kounou  ouaie,  ouaie,  ouaie,  mom-za   Mom- 


828 


COMPENSA  TION, 


COMPENSATION. 

IX  that  new  world  toward  which  our  feet  are  set, 
Shall  we  find  aught  to  make  our  hearts  forget 
Earth's  homely  joys  and  her  bright  hours  of  bliss  ? 
Has  heaven  a  spell  divine  enough  for  this  ? 
For  who  the  pleasure  of  fhe  spring  shall  tell, 
When  on  the  leafless  stalk  the  brown  buds  swell. 
When  the  grass  brightens  and  the  days  grow  long, 
And  little  birds  break  out  in  rippling  song  ? 

O  sweet  the  dropping  eve,  the  blush  of  mom, 

The  starlit  sky,  the  rustling  fields  of  corn. 

The  soft  airs  blowing  from  the  freshening  seas, 

The  sunflecked  shadow  of  the  stately  trees. 

The  mellow  thunder  and  the  lulling  rain. 

The  warm,  delicious,  happy  summer  rain. 

When  the  grass  brightens  and  the  days  grow  long, 

And  little  birds  break  out  in  rippling  song  I 

O  beauty  manifold,  from  mom  till  night, 

Dawn's  flush,  noon's  blaze  and  sunset's  tender  light! 

O  fair,  familiar  features,  changes  sweet 

Of  her  revolving  seasons,  storm  and  sleet 

And  golden  calm,  as  slow  she  wheels  through  space, 

From  snow  to  roses, —  and  how  dear  her  face, 

When  the  grass  brightens,  when  the  days  grow  long, 

And  little  birds  break  out  in  rippling  song  1 

O  happy  earth  I    O  home  so  well  beloved  ! 
What  recompense  have  we,  from  thee  removed  ? 
One  hope  we  have  that  overtops  the  whole, — 
The  hope  of  finding  even,'  vanished  soul. 
We  love  and  long  for  daily,  and  for  this 
Gladly  we  turn  fi-om  thee,  and  all  thy  bliss, 
Even  at  thy  loveliest,  when  the  days  are  long, 
And  little  birds  break  out  in  ripphng  song. 


Cdia  Thaxter. 


